November 1st

Leviticus 9:1-10:20, Mark 11:27-12:12, Psalm 29:1-11

What a lovely way to start a new month of our reading, God strikes down two of his priests with holy fire. Not an easy one to read. So what is going on?

It is always difficult for us to try and compare our understanding of the God of love who deals with us with such Grace and the God who did quite a bit of “smiting” in the Old Testament. It is extremely hard for us to question the motives of God, to ask why he killed, but we do know he is the God of justice. The Psalm tells us of the power of the voice of God, the God who brings peace, even if that involves drastic measures to ensure peace in the remnant. Ultimately God’s ways are far beyond our comprehension and we really just come back to the age old question of the validity of the death penalty. God only really carried out what he had said already in terms of the law, he didn’t just kill for the sake of it!

If we were to look at the individual case of Nadab and Abihu from the reading today it would seem that their crime is quite mild, a little bit of unauthorised fire in the tabernacle. But when we look deeper we see that there might have been a lot more at stake. The Lord suddenly bans Aaron and the other priests from drinking alcohol in the Tent of Meeting and you start to wonder whether they had been drunk when they lit the fire. These two had been put in a position of great responsibility. The theology of priesthood that applies here is that the priest stands directly between God and the people and intercedes on their behalf. When we look at all that we have seen about the glory of God, Nadab and Abihu were desecrating this before the Lord and on behalf of the people. This would have been a very serious crime. In our day and age, people don’t bat an eyelid when a church is desecrated but the relationship with God was paramount for the Israelites and so this would have been a heinous crime.

The charge that Jesus puts to the people in the Gospel is very similar. God is the owner of the vineyard and Jesus is saying that the people of Israel have killed or abused many of the messengers that he sent. They are abusing their relationship with God, Now the son of the vineyard owner (God) is here and they are going to kill him. When we read it as a story we are quite shocked with the tenants of the vineyard, and yet the point is serious. The Israelites at this stage are “the people of God” and just like in the Old Testament they are abusing the relationship.

Although the God of grace is not going to strike us down with fire, we still have to be aware that he wants us to keep his ordinances, to treat our relationship with God with the respect it deserves. The question is whether we do?